“The Best Damn Vernal Falls Photo In The World”

There’s quotes around the title. That means someone said it. That means it’s true. Ego much? 🙂

This time of the year there’s very little water in Yosemite National Park. The snows have not yet settled. Last year’s Winter was mild. Everything is as dry as a bone. And of course, it spent the summer burning. All of which means that you can get a lot closer to the foot of the falls than at any other time. Sounds like a perfect time for a field trip!

The drive from Silicon Valley to Yosemite passes through rich farming land. They grow all sorts of things that most of us take for granted. The above image is of an Almond Grove in the midday sun. Just a snap to break the 4 hour journey. The next two were taken out of the Jeep window, traveling at 50 mph so forgive the low quality. What’s all that green stuff on the trees? For miles the forest looked like this. Is it fire-retardant?

Arriving in the park by mid afternoon, I hang around with a few fellow camera carriers and snap this pleasing shot of the Autumn sunset from Tunnel View. Not a bad start to the trip.

That night I spent my time running through the forrest trying to capture Elves and Sprites. More of that in another post. For now, lets jump ahead to sunrise on the valley floor.

The above image is of first light. The red flash lasted about 10 seconds and then it was just clouds and cold blue light. I may have overdone the HDR in the next 2 images. Ho-hum.

You can’t quite see it in this photo but halfway down the river on the right hand bank a couple had camped for the night. No tent. Just blankets and presumably frost bite. I think this image captures them having early morning sex. I can’t be sure. It was very cold and they could have just been shivering.

And so to Vernal Falls.

As far as I could tell from the map, the waterfall was a brief 3 miles from my campsite along a nice river. The lesson here is to get a proper map, one with contour lines on it, not some crap they hand out for free. The walk was a climb. Sure, the fit amongst you could have sprinted it, but I’m old, out of shape, have a broken toe, and was carrying my body weight in equipment. Still I made it to the foot of the falls in reasonable time. Vernal is in a box canyon, three sides of which are sheer cliff faces. The pathway is carved in to one of these and winds past the falls up to the source – a further 1 mile climb that I refused to take.

I skipped over the safety rail and scrambled the 200 yards along the face of the cliff to the foot of the waterfall. At its peak this fall has maybe 100 times more water in it and I’d never be able to get this close. It’s dangerous (ish) out here on the wet rocks but I have my trusty life insurance policy, so I grab a quick selfie, turnaround and hike back off the mountain. (Note to wife: there’s a hint of a trail so hundreds of others must have done the same thing.)

Now normally, an old, out of shape, broken toed human carrying his weight in gear would only do this hike once a day, but not me; I’m stupid too. So I grab a coffee, pack enough flashlights to make daylight (let’s call it my plan B if the clouds don’t clear), my cold weather protection, and 30 minutes later I’m once again climbing the mountain back to the water fall.

I’ve made a plan. After the debacle that was Crater Lake, I put some effort in to this one. I know where to stand. I know what time the moon will be in a certain place in the sky. I know how much light it’s going to reflect down. And the weather service assure me that at 6pm the clouds will clear away. I have a plan. Now all I have to do is lie in the cold, wait for the dark to come, and try not to think about bears and mountain lions.

I snapped this shot with my phone. The image shows the sun setting out of sight, burning up the clouds as it dies for the day. If you look to the left of that dead tree you’ll see what looks like the silhouette of a person. It’s not. It’s an optical illusion. If that were a man, it would be 30 feet tall. The pathway I talked of is the thin white line the illusion is standing on. As you can see, I’ve scrambled out on a steep, dangerous rock face. This is important, it sets up the next part of the story.

The darkness arrives and with it the occasional bobbing headlamp of the day’s final hikers making their way home. It takes them about 15 minutes from entering the pathway at the top of the falls until they disappear behind the dead tree. After some time the traffic wanes and I’m alone. And then one more light appears. But it’s not right. It’s bobbing way to much: casting about maybe? In the dark your mind plays tricks. I imagine that the light is two people, one carrying the other. Something is wrong.  As the light makes progress I begin to suspect that it’s not even on the path. It’s totally dark, there’s no way of knowing but I’d swear the light is making it’s own route. And it’s slow. Really slow.

About 45 minutes later the light is about level with me, and thanks to a break in the cloud I can see the lone hiker. He’s nowhere near the path, scrambling down the cliff in the dark; probably to his doom. Praying that he doesn’t blister easily I hit him with all the lumens I’m carrying. The sudden daylight shows him his folly and his danger, and slumps down on a rock as I race over to his aid.

Now in future tellings, this story will grow to include a gaggle of overly grateful, bi-curious Victoria Secret nymphomaniacs, but for now his name is Charles. He’s lost his friends, he’s damaged his knee, and all he wants to do is go home. I lead him to the safety of the path and set him on his way. Immediately I regret not giving him food and water but in my rush to stop him crashing in to the river I never grabbed any. Still, he’s less than an hour from the park floor and the path is wide and easy. In the drunk telling of this story I saved his life. (*not even close to the truth)

Back at my camera the Gods of Kobal reward my kindness with a parting of the clouds. The moon crests the canyon at exactly the right time, in exactly the right place, and paints the waterfall in soft, white side light. Exactly as planned (for once).

Color me happy.

The above shot is a single 30 second exposure, with no editing other than white balance correction. This is exactly what the eyes saw standing alone at the base of Vernal Falls under the magnificent moon glow.

Adjusting my camera up to take a panorama of the stars, the next hour had me snapping over a hundred images of the streaking skies. Pasting those on to the shot above gives the “The Best Damn Vernal Falls Photo In The World”

Then the clouds rolled back over, the God’s satisfied that I’d got my money shot. And so all that was left was to hike home and grab a well earned beer.

May as well have a bowl of chili with that beer. And how about another beer sir?

Thanks for reading my ramblings.